GUARDIAN OF THE GREEN HILL

Age Range: 9 - 14

Pub Date: Oct. 25th, 2011ISBN: 978-0-8050-8985-1Publisher: Henry Holt

Weeks after her pivotal role in the Midsummer War in Under the Green Hill (2010), contemporary American Meg Morton must decide if she’s willing to “do the hard things” and become the Guardian of the Green Hill fairy sanctuary.

Visiting Great-Great Aunt Phyllida in the bucolic English countryside, Meg realizes she’s next in line to become Guardian of the Green Hill, a role passed through female descendants of the bloodline. Elderly and increasingly ineffective, Phyllida’s eager to prep Meg to mediate between the world of humans and the world of fairies. Although Meg feels a “mysterious pull . . . telling her to stay in England forever and be part of this strange life with the fairies,” she wants time to be sure. When a male relative with magical skills arrives to force the unsuspecting Phyllida to declare him her successor, and the fairies kidnap Meg’s little brother James, Meg’s forced to act. As the future Guardian, only she can enter the Green Hill to rescue James and claim her birthright. Set in a bygone landscape of hedgerows, half-timbered cottages and horse-drawn carts and teeming with creatures of faerie lore, this sequel offers a serious heroine with “steel at [her] core,” who discovers fairyland is not for the faint of heart.

Richly atmospheric storytelling in the tradition of Narnia and Nesbit. (Fantasy. 9-14)